Rumor mill: Seagate to buy SanDisk?

The big rumor is that Seagate Technology Inc. is interested in buying all or part of SanDisk Corp., according to sources in the industry. Some analysts dismissed the rumor, saying it would be a bad marriage.

Some speculated that Seagate is only interested in SanDisk's solid-state disk (SSD) unit. An older rumor is that Seagate is interested in acquiring Stec Inc., formerly SimpleTech Inc., a supplier of SSDs and other products.

Seagate recently filed a patent-infringement suit against Stec, which may cause Stec to give in the disk drive maker.

A spokesman for Seagate said the company does not comment on rumors. SanDisk has not responded to e-mails or phone calls about the rumors.

Seagate has a keen interest in flash technology. The company is a supplier of hard drives, but it sees SSDs as a potential threat to its traditional business.

Seagate is looking to hedge its bets. The world's largest hard disk drive maker has announced it will start shipping flash drives, also called SSDs in early 2009, initially aiming at products for servers.

Besides the SanDisk chatter, there have been other recent rumors involving Seagate. Seagate could be a buyer of Intel Corp.'s stake in IM Flash Technologies LLC, the joint NAND flash-memory manufacturing venture between Intel and Micron Technology Inc., according to an analyst.

It's all speculation right now, but rumors are running rampant that Intel will eventually exit the venture, said Daniel Amir, an analyst at Lazard Capital Markets, in a recent report.